Textile winding machines representative of the above-described type are manufactured by W. Schlafhorst & Co., of Monchengladbach, Germany, under the designation AUTOCONER 238, as described, for instance, in an operating manual published by W. Schlafhorst, entitled AUTOCONER 238.
Automatic cheese-producing textile machines of this kind typically have compressed air distribution systems, which are connected via energy units of the machine itself to a compressed air network supplying the entire spinning factory. As a rule, these energy units have a filter/water separator, a pressure monitor that monitors the input pressure and triggers an electromagnetic multi-position valve disposed at the compressed air input, and a number of pressure controllers.
By means of these pressure controllers, the pressure available at the compressed air input to the machine, typically at a level of 7 to 8 bar in the compressed air network of the spinning factory, is reduced to the different working pressures required of the pneumatic operating components of the textile machine, typically at the level of from 3 to 6 bar, and distributed via compressed air lines to the work stations of the textile machine. These compressed air lines typically comprise a number of plastic tubes that are joined into individual line segments and are each connected to one pressure controller via a connecting hose. At the work stations, connecting unions or like devices are disposed on the compressed air lines, so that branching compressed air lines can be attached.
The various compressed air lines, which each carry compressed air at a certain pressure level, are tapped via the branch lines, so that at each work station of the textile machine compressed air is available at the required pressure level, such as 3 bar, 5 bar, 6 bar, etc. Electromagnetic valves are also disposed in the various branches and are triggerable in a defined fashion via a winding station control unit or device to assure a targeted supply of variously required levels of compressed air to the various operating components, such as a cleaning device, opener tubules, splicers, etc.
The compressed air supply devices described above have proven themselves in practice to function very reliably. When the bobbin winding machine is processing multiple batches, however, and especially if the differing yarns to be processed make differing demands of the pneumatic operating components, it can become relatively complicated to supply a proper level of compressed air to the various operating components at each winding station.
Heretofore, for instance, it has been common for identical operating components of differing operating stations that are required to work at different pressure levels, e.g., adjacent groups or sections of winding stations, each to be supplied via separate pressure lines carrying the respectively required pressure levels. Since the various operating components are physically connected to the applicable compressed air line, converting them to another working pressure can prove to be somewhat difficult. For this purpose, it has been necessary first to disconnect the operating components from one pressure line and then to reconnect them to another pressure line, which can be relatively complicated.